Screening word usage in people affected by PTSD: an unbiased, cost effective, and novel screening method?

According to the World Health Organization, mental illness is the leading cause of disability worldwide accounting for 37% of years of healthy life lost. Prevention and early detection of mental health disorders is important for social stability and economic prosperity of every country and the world at large. Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a very common condition with more than 3 million cases per year in the US alone. PTSD symptoms usually start soon after a traumatic event. The right diagnosis in a timely manner is key to ensuring prompt treatment that could lead to a full recovery. Unfortunately, social stigma as well as self-presentation and self-assessment biases often prevent individuals from seeking timely evaluation, leading to delays in treatment and suboptimal outcomes. Previous studies show that various mental health conditions are associated with distinct patterns of language use. Analyzing language use may also help to avoid response bias in self-reports. In this study we show a number of language use differences between PTSD sufferers and controls. Our data also suggest that subgroups of people with the same mental health disorder (PTSD in this study) may have salient differences in their language use, particularly in word usage frequencies. Additionally, we show that word usage patterns may vary depending on the type of the text being analyzed. These factors need to be accounted for when creating screening tools based on language analysis. If properly developed, such tools may facilitate earlier PTSD diagnosis, leading to timely support and treatment, which are associated with better outcomes

Language profiles and naming in children with word finding difficulties

Objective: To examine whether lexical access problems in children with word finding difficulties (WFDs) are restricted to measures of naming or include wider language impairments and the extent to which language skills are related to performance in the accuracy, latency and definitions of lexical items that are comprehended. Patients and Methods: Thirty-one children with identified WFDs completed a set of standardized language measures and an experimental naming and definition task. Results: The current cohort had difficulties with a range of language tasks. Phonological fluency and non-word repetition measures were significantly impaired and different from those of typically developing children. Phonological processes and measures of receptive and expressive language predicted accuracy in naming comprehended items but failed to predict the latency to name or the provision of accurate definitions. Conclusion: Children with WFDs often have additional language difficulties; these difficulties are predictive of performance on confrontational naming tasks. Latency to name, although a significant impairment, was not related to the standardized measures. Further research is needed to identify measures associated with speed of lexical retrieval. The data highlight the importance of examining the precursors to lexical access difficulties and examining different indices of lexical performance when intervening with children's WFDs